Fantasy Map Maker Review

boardgamequest.com:

For some reason, I love looking at fantasy maps. As a kid, I was really into the Dragonlance books and I spent countless hours reading The Atlas of the Dragonlance Saga. It was a book of maps from various locations from the novels with interesting tidbits sprinkled in. I probably read it half a dozen times.

Even today, I enjoy games where you get to create your own map. The flip-and-write game Cartographers has been a staple around BGQ HQ for quite a while now. Today’s review seems partially inspired by that great game as we take a look at a roll-and-write game that wants to help you create beautiful-looking maps. Appropriately titled Fantasy Map Maker, it’s a print-and-play title that seeks to have you creating your own fantasy kingdom.

The goal in Fantasy Map Maker, other than creating an awesome-looking map, is to score the most points by the end of the game.

The game begins by selecting 5 quest cards, one from each category: nature, geology, landmarks, town, and the wheel. These are goals that will help you score points, with a max of 20 in each category.

Your player sheet features a wheel at the top, and a 6×6 grid at the bottom to create your map. At the start of each round, a player rolls 2 six-sided dice. Then each player will choose one value to determine the wedge on the wheel you’ll be crossing off, and the other number determines the size of the feature. So If I roll a 2 and a 6, I can either choose wedge 2 and draw a feature with a size of 6 on my map, or wedge 6 with a feature of 2 size.

The feature you draw (mountains, rivers, oceans, forests, towns, etc…) can be placed in any space on the map as long as it’s next to a previously drawn feature. The game starts with your castle already on the map, so you have a starting place to explore from.

The game ends, for a player, once they can’t use the dice results. Usually, because the particular wedge is full already. The other players continue playing until they finish and then points are scored. The player